Hale Soup
by Sahraylia
Summary: Stiles is sick. Derek is stubborn.


"Oh my god you are actually insane. When I said, 'I wish you were here,' I didn't mean, 'Please drop everything right the fuck now and drive two-hundred freaking miles out to UC Berkeley so you can take care of me and my stupid measly cold,' what the hell, Derek."

Stiles is a rumpled, congested, woefully indignant ball of tangled blankets and sheets, propped half-upright against a messy mound of pillows on his bed. His normally resplendent eyes are puffy and leaking, his mouth is partially open because he can't breathe through all the snot and shit in his sinuses, and his hair—thick and grown long since he graduated from high school—is in a truly impressive state of disarray. In short, Stiles is the epitome of a sick college kid.

Derek catalogues all of this silently from his casual perch in Stiles' open apartment window (which he climbed through, of course, because he still insists on acting like a creepy stalker, what the actual fuck, Derek). A moment later, he walks purposefully to the end of the bed and drops a large black duffel bag on top of the covers.

"Funny," Derek says, his voice perfectly level as he begins to unpack the contents of the bag, "That's pretty much exactly what I heard."

Stiles gawks in blatant disbelief at his frankly batshit-crazy, overprotective werewolf boyfriend. "I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself," he insists, though the weight of this statement is lessened slightly by a small perfunctory cough that rattles in the back of his chest. "I'm in college now, Derek. Big boy pants and everything. There is absolutely no reason for you to drive three freaking hours to play nursemaid for the weak human with a common cold."

Derek's features remain placid, but he rolls his eyes long-sufferingly while he arranges the items from the duffel bag next to Stiles' blanketed feet. "First," he says calmly. "I know you can take care of yourself, most of the time. But when you're sick is not one of those times, because your energy always gets shot and you usually can't get be bothered to get out of bed. Second, the drive took me two hours, not three, because I was speeding most of the way. And third," he adds, sniffing briefly, "your roommate isn't here." He frowns in disapproval. "You're alone."

Stiles sighs and waves one hand dismissively, deciding to let the whole speeding thing go for now. "Yeah, he's with his parents for the weekend."

Derek levels a hard stare at him. "And you conveniently neglected to mention this to me over the phone this morning."

Stiles huffs in exasperation. "Yes, I neglected to mention this to you because I knew if I did you would do something monumentally stupid and ultimately unnecessary, like, oh, I don't know, drive halfway across California to get here, but I didn't mention it and that's still exactly what you did, oh my god."

Derek twists around to face Stiles, the bag now fully unpacked. His mouth is pressed into a world-weary line, but his eyes are soft with grudgingly fond affection. "Stiles," he murmurs. "Shut up."

Stiles opens his mouth to make further protests, but Derek leans forward and quickly sticks a thermometer under his tongue. Stiles glares. Derek is undeterred.

"Sit still," he orders firmly. He zips up the now empty duffel bag and tosses it onto the floor. Stiles is still shooting daggers at Derek with his eyes, but he finally relents a little and settles back against the pillows, thermometer protruding from his lips at an awkward angle.

"Hay' 'oo," Stiles mumbles darkly, but there's less bite in his voice this time.

"Love you, too," Derek responds.

Several moments pass as Derek busies himself with the contents of the duffel bag. Stiles watches him silently as he sets two bottles of water, a blister pack of cold medicine, and a box of Kleenex on the nightstand. When Derek gets up to bring a container of tea and what look like assorted soup-making items into the open kitchenette, Stiles' eyes widen.

"Rrr 'oo 'aking 'ee hoop?" he questions around the thermometer. "An' 'hee?"

"Stop talking," says Derek, taking out pots and a wooden spoon like he's been in the kitchen a million times before, and not for the first time ever. "And yes."

Stiles gapes incredulously at that, but surprisingly enough, he doesn't try to say anything more.

A few minutes later, Derek has just started to heat a can of chicken noodle soup and a pot of water on the stove, when Stiles' thermometer beeps. He takes it out of his mouth and checks the digital reading.

"Ha!" he exclaims, perhaps a little hoarsely, "No fever!"

"Good for you," Derek deadpans, not even turning around to look at Stiles as he stirs the soup. "Now take your meds, drink a bottle of water, and blow your nose."

Stiles pouts at Derek's back. "I'm not a kid, you know."

"You've said that a few hundred times. Right now I beg to differ."

"Bossypants."

But Stiles takes the meds, downs the water, and blows his nose wetly into a Kleenex, in that order.

Derek is still busy doing whatever the fuck in the kitchen, so Stiles reaches towards the pile of duffel bag items and begins to sort through them. A mildly stunned expression gradually freezes his features with each discovery.

"Echinacea?" he asks, genuinely dumbfounded. "Vicks Vapor Rub? Honey menthol cough drops? Orange juice?" He drops these items into his lap and raises his head to Derek, who is still facing away from him. "You got all of my cold stuff."

Derek tenses briefly, shrugs. "I know how you get when you're sick."

A tiny smile tugs at the corner of Stiles' mouth. "Evidently." His jaw drops when he spots a DVD case in the mess of various other medicinal things. "Oh my god, you actually brought my copy of Holy Grail? But you hated that movie!"

Derek has turned around now, bearing a bowl of chicken noodle soup in one hand and a steaming mug of tea in the other. His posture and expression are an odd mixture of defensiveness and… embarrassment?

"Yeah," he grunts, actually grunts. "But you love it."

Stiles stares at Derek. Derek shifts uncomfortably.

Then, Stiles grins, wide and open and easy. "Thanks."

Derek relaxes, marginally, but he's smiling, too. Well, at least his eyes are smiling. Or scrunching, but there's a time and a place for semantics.

"You're welcome."

So then Derek brings Stiles the soup and tea, setting them both on a TV tray he had managed to fit in the duffel bag, and after a half-hearted argument, Stiles allows Derek to squeeze his enormous bulk onto the bed next to him. For the next few hours, they watch Monty Python on Derek's laptop while Stiles dutifully eats his soup and drinks his tea (although the soup is a bit on the lukewarm side and the tea is steeped a few minutes too strong, but you know, Stiles considers himself to be a pretty flexible guy). Half an hour into the movie, after Stiles finishes the soup and tea, Derek sets the TV tray off to one side so he can pull Stiles' body back up against his chest and between the open 'v' of his legs. At this point, Stiles is pleasantly full and warm and just sleepy enough to be manhandled without complaint. So he lets Derek wrap both his arms securely around his chest, lets him loosely intertwine their legs, and they watch the rest of the movie in relative silence, content in each other's company.

Stiles' werewolf boyfriend may be batshit-crazy and overprotective on the best of days, but that's also what makes him pretty fucking awesome in Stiles' well-informed (thank you very much) opinion.

Even though he's not a Monty Python fan.


End file.
